Impact Litigation and Advocacy Work

Students work on a broad range of impact litigation and policy projects. Students have contributed to key litigation to limit the immigration consequences of criminal convictions, and to restrict the government’s ability to detain immigrants for prolonged periods of time. Students have also engaged in local and federal regulatory advocacy, legislative work, public education, and other policy work on a broad range of projects to advance the rights of immigrant communities.

"It was reinvigorating working and interacting with the people that we are trying to help. Specifically, hearing the stories of the clients that I helped about why they came the US, the sacrifices they made to be able to come to this country…I hope that our work in this advocacy project can make an impact for these clients."

Arturo Schultz, JD '17

Clinic Alumni Talk About Impact Litigation & Advocacy Work

Kara McBride (JD ’15)

Orion Danjuma (JD ’10)

Professor Jayashri Srikantiah on Access to Justice for Detained Immigrants

The Immigrants’ Rights Clinic and Professor Jayashri Srikantiah received the CLAY (California Lawyer Attorney of the Year) award for 2014 from California Lawyer magazine. Along with others, the IRC was recognized for its work establishing rights to bond release hearings for immigrants detained for more than six months. With the ACLU, the IRC has been litigating the prolonged detention issue in the Ninth Circuit for many years, through individual cases as well as Rodriguez v. Robbins, a long-standing class action suit for which the U.S. District Court issued a summary judgment ruling requiring automatic bond hearings as soon as immigrants reach six months of detention. Many terrific students have worked on this project over the years, including Michael Kaufman (JD ’07), who has now gone on to work at the ACLU as a lawyer on Rodriguez.